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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1208 



a member of the American Association for 

 the Advancement of Science for twenty years 

 and I think I was consulted only once in re- 

 gard to a suitable candidate for the presidency 

 of this Association. As far as I know the 

 presidents of this Association have always 

 been selected properly and the selections have 

 perhaps been better than they would have 

 been if a more democratic method had been 

 employed, but it is questionable whether the 

 scientific public of America takes as deep an 

 interest in its leading scientific men as it 

 would have taken if it had really had a part 

 in bestowing a high scientific honor on some 

 of them. 



I have been a member of the Society of the 

 Sigma Xi for about twenty years and do not 

 think I have ever had any part in the selection 

 of a candidate for national president, although 

 I voted once or twice for the one who was 

 nominated by a committee. It may be said 

 that I could have wielded an influence in the 

 selection of candidates for these high offices 

 if I had wanted to do so but many of us have 

 so many duties to perform that we seldom go 

 outside this range of interests. The question 

 is whether it should not be put in such a way 

 that a much larger number of the scientific 

 men would regard it as a part of their duty 

 to take an active part in the bestowal of high 

 scientific honors. If this is not done these 

 honors will usually be bestowed by a few men 

 who will generally make wise selections but 

 will fail to arouse much general interest. 



In some of the national societies devoted to 

 special subjects there seems to be still greater 

 need for thoroughly democratic methods of 

 election in case we are seeking to establish in 

 America a real democracy along these lines. 

 Many of us regard elections as necessary evils 

 which should receive the least possible at- 

 tention. There are various other means of 

 expressing scientific appreciation and a sci- 

 entific democracy should by no means be 

 judged mainly by the methods employed in 

 the selection of officers. These methods have, 

 however, their influence in creating a spirit of 

 openness and wide interest, and it is at least 

 conceivable that the extra labor involved in 



making scientific elections more democratic 

 would be wisely spent. G. A. Miller 



ARE ZOOLOGISTS GOING TO USE THE BNA? 



It is perhaps as justifiable as it is interest- 

 ing that scientists are the slowest people to 

 take hold of new ideas and radical changes. 

 Tet there seems to be little justification for a 

 group of men remaining silent and at the same 

 time failing to use modem inventions in. 

 their field which have proved useful and 

 effective. 



Most zoologists are familiar with the ex- 

 cellent work of the Commission from the 

 Anatomical Society which undertook the re- 

 vision of the nomenclature of human anatomy. 

 It must be a great source of satisfaction to 

 this body of men to see how well the anato- 

 mists have responded to the simplification and 

 standardization of terms, for now all the text- 

 books and many of the medical men have 

 adopted the BNA, making a bedlam of terms 

 easy to understand. 



However, up to the present time the com- 

 parative anatomists and zoologists in general 

 have not adopted or used this nomenclature, 

 so that one may read of the " dorsal root " of 

 a spinal nerve in a pig embryo and the 

 " posterior root " of a spinal nerve in human 

 anatomy. Indeed the workers in the field 

 of human embryology still use terms which 

 do not apipear in the BlfA. 



Perhaps the most confusing set of terms are 

 the following : anterior and posterior ; dorsal 

 and ventral, and superior and inferior. It 

 would seem preferable to use drosal and 

 ventral instead of anterior and posterior and 

 then use anterior and posterior to mean 

 superior and inferior, for there seems to be no 

 particular need for upsetting the whole of the 

 comparative terms to accommodate only one 

 type of animal. But this is not a matter for 

 one individual to decide and since the Com- 

 mission has decided differently and their re- 

 port has been accepted and adopted, there 

 seems to be but one thing to do, and that is 

 follow their nomenclature. If the zoologists 

 wish to use the words " dorsal and ventral " 



